Psalm 69:3-343 I have become stuck in a deep quagmire, and there is no firm footing. I have arrived at the height of the sea, and a tempest has overwhelmed me.4 I have endured hardships, while crying out. My jaws have become hoarse; my eyes have failed. Meanwhile, I hope in my God.5 Those who hate me without cause have been multiplied beyond the hairs of my head. My enemies, who persecuted me unjustly, have been strengthened. Then I was required to pay for what I did not take.6 O God, you know my foolishness, and my offenses have not been hidden from you.7 Let those who wait for you, O Lord, the Lord of hosts, not be shamed in me. Let those who seek you, O God of Israel, not be confounded over me.8 For because of you, I have endured reproach; confusion has covered my face.9 I have become a stranger to my brothers and a sojourner to the sons of my mother.10 For zeal for your house has consumed me, and the reproaches of those who reproached you have fallen upon me.11 And I covered my soul with fasting, and it has become a reproach to me.12 And I put on a haircloth as my garment, and I became a parable to them.13 Those who sat at the gate spoke against me, and those who drank wine made me their song.14 But as for me, truly, my prayer is to you, O Lord. This time has pleased you well, O God. In the multitude of your mercy, in the truth of your salvation, hear me.15 Rescue me from the quagmire, so that I may not become trapped. Free me from those who hate me and from deep waters.16 Do not allow the tempest of water to submerge me, nor the deep to absorb me. And do not allow the well to close in on me.17 Hear me, O Lord, for your mercy is kind. Look upon me, according to the fullness of your compassion.18 And do not turn your face away from your servant, for I am in trouble: heed me quickly.19 Attend to my soul, and free it. Rescue me, because of my enemies.20 You know my reproach, and my confusion, and my reverence.21 All those who trouble me are in your sight; my heart has anticipated reproach and misery. And I sought for one who might grieve together with me, but there was no one, and for one who might console me, and I found no one.22 And they gave me gall for my food. And in my thirst, they gave me vinegar to drink.23 Let their table be a snare before them, and a retribution, and a scandal.24 Let their eyes be darkened, so that they may not see, and may their back always be crooked.25 Pour out your indignation upon them, and may the fury of your anger take hold of them.26 May their dwelling place be deserted, and may there be no one who dwells in their tabernacles.27 For they persecuted whomever you struck. And they have added to the grief of my wounds.28 Assign an iniquity upon their iniquity, and may they not enter into your justice.29 Delete them from the Book of the Living, and let them not be written down with the just.30 I am poor and sorrowful, but your salvation, O God, has taken me up.31 I will praise the name of God with a canticle, and I will magnify him with praise.32 And it will please God more than a new calf producing horns and hoofs.33 Let the poor see and rejoice. Seek God, and your soul will live.34 For the Lord has heard the poor, and he has not despised his prisoners.Exodus 2:1-15a1 After these things, a man from the house of Levi went out, and he took a wife from his own stock.2 And she conceived and bore a son. And seeing him to be handsome, she hid him for three months.3 And when she was no longer able to hide him, she took a small basket woven of bulrushes, and she smeared it with pitch as well as tar. And she placed the little infant inside, and she laid him in the sedges by the bank of the river.4 His sister was standing at a distance and was wondering what would happen.5 Then, behold, the daughter of Pharaoh descended to wash in the river. And her maids walked along the edge of the cove. And when she had seen the small basket among the papyruses, she sent one of her servants for it. And when it was brought,6 she opened it; and realizing that within it was a little one crying, she took pity on him, and she said: "This is one of the infants of the Hebrews."7 And the sister of the boy said to her: "If you wish, I will go and call to you a Hebrew woman, who will be able nurse the infant."8 She responded, "Go." The maid went directly and called her mother.9 And the daughter of Pharaoh said to her: "Take this boy and nurse him for me. I will give you your wages." The woman took and nursed the boy. And when he was mature, she delivered him to the daughter of Pharaoh.10 And she adopted him in place of a son, and she called his name Moses, saying, "Because I took him from the water."11 In those days, after Moses had grown up, he went out to his brothers. And he saw their affliction and an Egyptian man striking a certain one of the Hebrews, his brothers.12 And when he had looked around this way and that, and had seen no one nearby, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.13 And going out the next day, he spotted two Hebrews quarrelling violently. And he said to him who was causing the injury, "Why do you strike your neighbor?"14 But he responded: "Who appointed you as leader and judge over us? Do you want to kill me, just as yesterday you killed the Egyptian?" Moses was afraid, and he said, "How has this word become known?"15 And Pharaoh heard this talk, and he sought to kill Moses.